Healthy & Safe Relationships

We know there are many types of relationships. This page focuses on romantic or sexual relationships. Everyone deserves to be safe and treated with respect. Here are some great resources to help you make sure your relationships are healthy, get the facts on consent, and learn to recognize sexual assault and intimate partner violence (often called dating violence or abuse).

Healthy Relationships

Every relationship is unique—just like every person is an individual. But there are things they all have in common: good communication, mutual respect, and honesty, for a start. Sometimes, unhealthy relationships can be an indicator of human trafficking. If you’re looking for ways to improve your relationships, there’s lots of help here:

Consent

Consent means having or giving permission for something to happen. It begins with communication and is a critical part of any healthy sexual encounter. It may seem awkward to talk about it, but it’s the only way to for people to respect each other’s boundaries. The State of Illinois has laws about consent that punish people who take advantage of others sexually, but these laws can vary from state to state. Read on to learn more.

Gender Norms

From a young age, we may be taught that we should look or act a certain way because we are male or female: males should be masculine and females should be feminine. Many people think of femininity as a combination of being delicate, a caretaker, and attractive; while they understand masculinity as a combination of being strong, emotionally tough, aggressive, and sexual. These expectations are called gender norms. What you may not know is that there is a link between gender norms and unhealthy relationships and unsafe sex (e.g., not using condom or birth control). Learn more about gender norms here.